Top 3 Best Forex Trading Courses - Free vs Paid
Updated: Feb 13, 2022
Not all forex courses are made equal, and for those just starting out, it's a daunting dilemma on which to choose. Since 2013, it's been our mission to decide which forex trading course is best (even creating our own in 2021), with many leaving a lot to be desired. Below we've ranked the top 3 forex trading courses, to help learners easily compare which course is best suited to them.
Top 3 Best Forex Trading Courses of 2021
Best Overall (4.7 out of 5): Logikfx Beginners Forex Trading Course
Best Free (2.4 out of 5): Babypips
Best Range of Courses (2.1 out of 5): Investopedia Academy
Ranking factors include:
Support and guidance
Engagement
Emphasis on problem-solving
Performance tracking
Personalised learning tips
Objectives and expected outcomes
Teacher(s) and/or Author(s)
No conflict of interest
Reviews
Accessibility
Pricing
Community
And after enrolling, completing, and testing many forex trading courses under those conditions, it was to no surprise that many of the products available leave a lot to be desired.
A good course, must encourage problem-solving, and focus on helping the student learn the content faster, and more efficiently.
Based upon this, we've come up with our Top 3 Forex Trading Courses, with only the Beginner Forex Trading Course (BFTC) by Logikfx meeting our minimum quality standards:
Best Overall
Logikfx.com
Support and guidance 4/5
Each video allows students to comment on specific time-stamps, which can then be answered accordingly. Logikfx also has a dedicated private forum for course students only, to ask questions directly to Authors:
Logikfx also provides a full set of notes, to help traders save massive amounts of time on the learning process, and can jump straight into the understanding of content:
Engagement 4/5
Video lessons are short, and effective, focusing on understanding, not just memorising definitions - with guided annotations for every example. It's clear the author(s) are focused on engaging with students as much as possible through thought-provoking videos, customisable quizzes, and performance tracking.
Emphasis on problem-solving 5/5
Over 400 dynamic questions for students to choose from in the quiz builder application. Logikfx has claimed to be adding hundreds of questions each month to avoid students repeating questions.
Performance tracking 5/5
Students course progress is tracked as a percentage, with a clear goal of how many lessons are left before completion:
Students quiz performance is tracked per video, with dynamic personal recommendations:
Students overall quiz performance is tracked to help them gauge their understanding of the whole course:
Personalised learning tips 5/5
For each video, the student will get a recommendation on which lessons need work, and which ones they're performing great at:
Objectives and expected outcomes 5/5
The objectives and outcomes are clear and concise. Nearly all logikfx customer reviews have a positive experience meeting the objectives of the course.
Teacher(s) and/or Author(s) 5/5
This course is created by Marcus Raiyat who is well-known in the industry for his ability to simplify complex financial topics. Read more about Marcus...
No conflict of interest 5/5
Logikfx is known in the industry for holding NO ties or agreements with brokerages, and or other providers that may encourage any conflict of interest.
Reviews 5/5
Logikfx is rated "excellent" on Trustpilot:
Accessibility 4/5
Logikfx's forex course can be accessed on any web-based device that has access to a browser. For mobile users, they will have to request the desktop version of the site to get full usage.
Pricing 5/5
This course is paid, currently priced at £199 GBP. When compared to free courses, and other courses that charge thousands for a far less quality product, this price far below it's value.
Community 4/5
Logikfx's community is young and fast-growing. With active online forums, YouTube channels, Telegram channels, webinars and much more - there is always something, for every type of learner.
Total rating = 2.4 out of 5
Pros
Self-paced free online course
beginner friendly
Performance tracking
No-cost, free course
Cons
Information is very basic in nature (it is free after all)
Large conflict of interest with on-going introducing broker agreements
All author(s) are anonymous
No video content
Geared towards majority technical analysis
Lack of personalised guidance and support for students
No clear learning objectives or outcomes
No downloadable course notes
Support and guidance 3/5
There is no dedicated support from author(s), but rather an anonymous forum open to all.
Engagement 2/5
Babypips' includes course progression, alongside guided text-based lessons. Reading is a lot less engaging than guided lessons through video format, but style has it's merit in being beginner friendly.
Emphasis on problem-solving 3/5
Although Babypips offers trading quizzes, their is no emphasis for course students to pro-actively take the quizzes alongside the relevant learning material. Rather it's a separate product, with no chronological format.
Performance tracking 4/5
Babypips offers a performance tracking dashboard to allow users to track how many lessons they have completed - but there is no associated question performance tracking per-lesson:
Personalised learning tips 0/5
As far as we are aware, babypips offers no personalised tips to help students learn better. Students are left to read vast amounts of material, with no support on where they need to improve, or even where their strengths lie.
Objectives and expected outcomes 1/5
There are no clear objectives or outcomes from the Babypips forex course. Rather readers are just left to their own accord, and have to workout a structured plan for themselves.
Teacher(s) and/or Author(s) 0/5
There are no real names, or credible author(s) or teacher(s) referred to anywhere on the website. Instead, Babypips refers to content creators with anonymous names. This of-course puts into question to integrity of the course material:
No conflict of interest 0/5
Babypips' offers multiple broker advertisements, where they are paid based on their students trading activity.
This is a common industry conflict of interest - as it incentivises Babypips to adapt their course material towards you signing up with their recommended broker, rather than to help students learn how to trade.
It also encourages Babypips to teach higher frequency, higher leverage strategies, that yield a higher return from their broker referrals if their students use those types of methods. Unfortunately, these strategies come at the cost of the students success, but line the pockets of the referrer (Babypips) and the broker.
Reviews 4/5
As a free course, Babypips is stay on top with positive reviews. There is no cost to the student, and therefore any value, is seen as good value in the eyes of the reader. The only reason it doesn't get 5 stars, is because the content of the course material, is very basic in nature, and does not compare to it's paid course counterparts.
Accessibility 4/5
The Babypips course can be accessed via any online browser platform.
Pricing 5/5
It's free.
Community 3/5
Active online forum, but mostly full of beginners, which means a lot of the answers to questions are below par.
Total rating = 2.1 out of 5
Pros
Lifetime access to all learning material
Financial support for students and U.S. military
Credible author(s)
Affordable pricing
Cons
Information is very basic in nature - very short video lessons
Geared towards majority technical analysis
Lack of personalised guidance and support for students
No downloadable course notes
No quizzes or testing methods
Conflict of interest with Introducing Broker Agreements
Lack of active community
No direct support from instructors
Poor interactivity and engagement with students
Support and guidance 1/5
There seems to be no live support, no active forum, or direct contact with instructors of the course material - rather Investopedia Academy has a lot of self-learning material, with a ticketing system if a student gets stuck:
This method of support is very poor compared to other course providers.
Engagement 2/5
No performance tracking, no quizzes, no forums, no personalised learning tips, but video lessons provide a feeling of being in a classroom with 3rd-person camera shots.
The note taking, also has to be fully done by the student, which in studies has proven to have no effectiveness in helping students understand, versus students who have notes made for them.
Ideally, Investopedia Academy would've created notes for their users. As they did not, their engagement score suffers.
Emphasis on problem-solving 0/5
No emphasis on solving problems, but rather focuses just on providing information that the student has to remember on their own from a series of videos on demand.
Performance tracking 0/5
There is no performance tracking included in the course.
Personalised learning tips 0/5
There are no personalised learning tips for each student enrolled.
Objectives and expected outcomes 5/5
Investopedia provide very clear and concise learning objectives and outcomes to students before they enrol on their course:
Teacher(s) and/or Author(s) 4/5
Investopedia have recognised author(s) and teacher(s), but student contact with said instructors is not a common thing. We assume, Investopedia hires contractors to create courses, and then they are no long apart of the academy ecosystem.
No conflict of interest 0/5
Investopedia offers multiple broker advertisements, where they are paid based on their students trading activity.
This is a common industry conflict of interest - as it incentivises Investopedia to adapt their course material towards you signing up with their recommended broker, rather than to help students learn how to trade.
It also encourages Investopedia Academy to teach higher frequency, higher leverage strategies, that yield a higher return from their broker referrals if their students use those types of methods. Unfortunately, these strategies come at the cost of the students success, but line the pockets of the referrer (Investopedia) and the broker.
Reviews 3/5
According to Trustpilot reviews for investopedia, their content is on average 3.1 out of 5 from various student experiences:
Accessibility 5/5
The Investopedia Forex course can be accessed via any online browser platform.
Pricing 5/5
This course is paid, currently priced at £144.08 GBP. When compared to free courses, and other courses that charge thousands for a far less quality product.
Community 0/5
Investopedia academy currently has no forums
Conclusion: What makes a good beginner forex trading course?
And to summarise our findings, to help us come up with our top 3 forex courses, in general the following criteria can be assigned to bad and good forex courses respectively:
Bad Online Forex Trading Course:
Holds Introducing Brokers Agreements - refers you to brokers for a kick back and based on your trading activity
Doesn’t go in-detail on how fundamentals drive the market price
No credible author(s)
No quizzes or methods for students to test their knowledge
No emphasis on helping students understand, and instead just give out information that can be found in a text book
no community support
no performance tracking
no personalised learning tips
Makes students make their own notes - which reduces the efficiency of their learning
Good Online Forex Trading Course:
An experienced instructor teaching the course, focusing on understanding and not just cramming information
Little to no conflict of interests through referral agreements
Focus on help students understand and learn information, rather than just reading from a text book
Clear and achievable learning objectives
A track record of successful student reviews who've been through the course
Easily accessible on any device
Affordable, whilst still retaining effective content
in-depth videos, that go beyond the basics you can find for free online
Continued support and guidance, before, during and after completion
Personalised learning tips to help support trading decisions
An active community to ask questions, and discuss learning material with other students
Clear way for students to track performance, for motivation
Winner: Logikfx Beginner Forex Course
The only course to meet our minimum quality standards is Logikfx’s forex trading course. - which ranks as the best forex course available for beginners online. With custom quizzes, performance tracking, credible author(s) and a fast growing community, it meets all of the traits of a good course.
I hope this article has helped you identify the pros and cons of the best forex courses out there.
